Facebook glitch hands off control of corporate Pages

Facebook inadvertently handed over administrative control for about 17 Facebook Pages on Wednesday, including pages for Microsoft and several airlines.

The bug was noticed late Wednesday by Tom Krieglstein, founder of Chicago-based technology training company Swift Kick, who found he had been granted administrative access to Pages belonging to Microsoft, Southwest Airlines and American Airlines. “I was just looking at my Pages,” he said in an interview Thursday. “I noticed that it was showing me other companies’ as well.” The largest Page, Star Wars, allowed him to send a message out to more than 825,000 fans.

Facebook users typically set up their own profiles to share information about themselves, but they can also set up Facebook Pages to share information about businesses they own or represent. The popular social network has undergone a major redesign in recent weeks, including a revamped version of Facebook Pages

Krieglstein believes a glitch in the redesign allowed him to get control of the Pages. To test that he really did have administrative control, he sent out a link to the Star Wars group of a child playing the movie’s theme song on a harp. Within a few hours, about 450 people had clicked on the link.

Krieglstein said he could have kicked other administrators off the Pages, added content, or even deleted the Pages altogether. Facebook representatives were not immediately able to comment Thursday.

Krieglstein lost administrative control of the other Pages around 2 p.m. Pacific time Thursday, shortly after the blog Allfacebook.com posted a story about the glitch.

He also lost control of his own Pages. “Now I’m not even admin on my own company,” he said.

He doesn’t know what caused the problem but believes that he may have had administrative control of the Pages ever since Facebook began rolling out the redesign a few weeks ago. “I think it’s just Facebook pushing out too quickly,” he said. “I really think it was just a kink in the new code.”

Would you recommend this article?

Share

Thanks for taking the time to let us know what you think of this article!
We'd love to hear your opinion about this or any other story you read in our publication.


Jim Love, Chief Content Officer, IT World Canada

Featured Download

Featured Articles

Cybersecurity in 2024: Priorities and challenges for Canadian organizations 

By Derek Manky As predictions for 2024 point to the continued expansion...

Survey shows generative AI is a top priority for Canadian corporate leaders.

Leaders are devoting significant budget to generative AI for 2024 Canadian corporate...

Related Tech News

Tech Jobs

Our experienced team of journalists and bloggers bring you engaging in-depth interviews, videos and content targeted to IT professionals and line-of-business executives.

Tech Companies Hiring Right Now